This book considers the theoretical and empirical claims of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) in developed and developing countries. It is structured as a debate between leading MMT theorists and MMT critics. MMT threw down a challenge to mainstream economics and forced it to respond, above all in the USA. This is a rare occurrence, almost unknown, for heterodox economics during the last few decades. It is not surprising, therefore, that MMT has attracted strong attention from a broad swathe of researchers. It is even less surprising that it has become the theoretical vehicle of choice for political activists opposing austerity. Its influence is remarkable and has gradually spread to other social disciplines, including even cultural theory. Furthermore, the policy responses to coronavirus by several governments, particularly the extraordinary expansion of central bank balance sheets in 2020, appears to support MMT in practice. This volume takes into account the rising popularity of MMT and considers its theoretical claims in depth, since popularity does not necessarily equate to being right in theory. It also considers MMT claims regarding fiscal and monetary policy in view of the implications of the pandemic crisis for public spending and public debt. It is not accidental that the strongest support for MMT, in both theory and policy, is to be found in the USA, since MMT conclusions rely heavily on close institutional analysis of US government financing mechanisms. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of The Japanese Political Economy.

Walter Bagehot noticed once that "John Bull can stand many things, but he cannot stand two per cent." Well, for several years, he has had to stand interest rates well below that, in some countries even below zero. However, despite this sacrifice, the economic recovery from the Great Recession has been disappointingly weak. This book's aim is to answer this question. The central thesis of the book is that the standard understanding of the monetary transmission mechanism is flawed. That understanding adopts erroneous assumptions-such as, that low interest rates always stimulate economic growth by boosting the credit supply, investment, and consumption-and does not fully take into account several unintended channels of monetary policy, such as risk-taking, high level of debt, or zombification of the economy. In other words, the effectiveness of monetary policy is limited during economic downturns accompanied by the debt overhang and the balance sheet recession, and generates negative effects, which can make the policy counterproductive. The author provides a thorough analysis of the issues related to the interest rates in the conduct of monetary policy, such as the risk-taking channel of monetary policy, the portfolio-balance channel and the wealth effect, zombie firms in the economy, the misallocation of resources, as well as the neutral interest rate targeting and the difference between the neutral and natural interest rate and the negative interest rate policy. The book is written in an accessible and engaging manner and will be a valuable resource for scholars of monetary economics as well as readers interested in (unconventional) monetary policy.

State-owned enterprises (SOEs) combine economic activities resulting from their position on the market with non-economic functions determined by the state owner. In many of the world's major economies, SOEs play an important role, and in some, such as China, India, Russia and Brazil, they are outright dominant. At the same time, the existence of SOEs is largely ignored by economic theory and the current figures on SOEs on a global scale available in the literature are questionable in terms of their methodological validity and thus they do not allow for a proper cross-country analysis. This book fills this research gap. It focuses on the scope and importance of SOEs in a broad group of the largest economies, primarily on a variety of quantitative estimates. It contains the results of an extensive and unique empirical study of 37 of the world's largest economies over the period from 2009 to 2018. The findings showed that the average share of SOEs - measured by operating revenues and total assets - in the group of the largest 100 enterprises (Top 100) of a given country is nearly 30%, while in the Top 20 group it is even slightly higher. The authors present an econometric analysis showing the relationship between the scope of SOEs and the various economic and non-economic characteristics of the studied set of countries. The book also contains an in-depth discussion of selected key issues, such as the functions of SOEs in various types of economies, the role of SOEs in capital markets and the phenomenon of SOEs with foreign capital. This work is addressed to both academic economists, dealing with macroeconomics and economic policy, as well as researchers and analysts from various international organizations and think-tanks.

Milton Friedman is beyond question the most famous living economist of the 20th century. He is closely associated with the doctrine of 'monetarism' which has been adopted by many governments around the world.This important two volume collection presents a major study of Milton Friedman's outstanding contribution to economics as a teacher at the University of Chicago. It shows how Friedman's distinctive ideas about money, markets and economic theory, communicated in the classroom and in thesis committees, influenced an entire generation of economists. It also reveals his influence on graduate-education practices at the University of Chicago and elsewhere.

A solid investigation on China's floating exchange rate regime. Explains why most countries favor a floating exchange rate regime under the existing international monetary system. Based on important discussions about about exchange rate policies under multilateral and bilateral supervisionsat the IMF and experts from the CME Group and the London FX market. Draws on cases, experiences and lessons of the US, Japan, India, Russia, Brazil, Argentina, Egypt, Pakistan, etc.

Assessing the potential benefits and risks of a currency union Leaders of the fifteen-member Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) have set a goal of achieving a monetary and currency union by late 2020. Although some progress has been made toward achieving this ambitious goal, major challenges remain if the region is to realize the necessary macroeconomic convergence and establish the required institutional framework in a relatively short period of time. The proposed union offers many potential benefits, especially for countries with historically high inflation rates and weak central banks. But, as implementation of the euro over the past two decades has shown, folding multiple currencies, representing disparate economies, into a common union comes with significant costs, along with operational challenges and transitional risks. All these potential negatives must be considered carefully by ECOWAS leaders seeking to meet a self-imposed deadline. This book, by two leading experts on economics and Africa, makes a significant analytical contribution to the debates now under way about how ECOWAS could achieve and manage its currency union, and the ramifications for the African continent.

This innovative text offers an introduction to money, banking, and financial markets, with a special emphasis on the importance of confidence and trust in the macroeconomic system. It also presents the theory of endogenous money creation, in contrast to the standard money multiplier and fractional reserve explanation found in other textbooks. The U.S. economy and financial institutions are used to explain the theoretical and practical framework, with international examples weaved in throughout the text. It covers key topics including monetary policy, fiscal policy, accounting principles, credit creation, central banks, and government treasuries. Additionally, the book considers the international economy, including exchange rates, the Eurozone, Chinese monetary policy, and reserve currencies. Taking a broad look at the financial system, it also looks at banking regulation, cryptocurrencies, real estate, and the oil and gold commodity markets. Students are supported with chapter objectives, key terms, and problems. A test bank is available for instructors. This is an accessible introductory textbook for courses on money and banking, macroeconomics, monetary policy, and financial markets.

The S&L crisis of the 1990s has given many a reason to review the events which led to a (in many ways) similar banking crisis sixty years ago, and the subsequent legislation of the Emergency Banking Act, the Banking Act of 1933, the Banking Act of 1935, and other related legislation. The reconstituted financial structure produced the longest period of financial stability in the US history, lasting one-half of a century. The book has two goals: provide an understanding of the reasons the banking reforms enacted in the 1930s were so successful; and present a set of policy proposals which offer the institutional provisions for both the financing of the capital development of the economy, and a safe payments system.

'A fascinating portal into arguments about why we need to get beyond money' - Harry Cleaver What would a world without money look like? This book is a lively thought experiment that deepens our understanding of how money is the driver of political power, environmental destruction and social inequality today, arguing that it has to be abolished rather than repurposed to achieve a postcapitalist future. Grounded in historical debates about money, Anitra Nelson draws on a spectrum of political and economic thought and activism, including feminism, ecoanarchism, degrowth, permaculture, autonomism, Marxism and ecosocialism. Looking to Indigenous rights activism and the defence of commons, an international network of activists engaged in a fight for a money-free society emerges. Beyond Money shows that, by organising around post-money versions of the future, activists have a hope of creating a world that embodies their radical values and visions.

This book presents the theoretical framework for the evolution of the international monetary system and the internationalization of the RMB. Combining theoretical research and empirical study, it then provides an in-depth analysis of the relevant issues from multiple perspectives based on this framework. Written by former chief economist at the Bank of China, this book explains the "two-step strategy" from the capital account opening to the full convertibility of the RMB, it also analyzes the status and functions of the HK offshore financial market in internationalizing the RMB.

This book delves into the many innovative changes that the financial industry has undergone in recent years. The authors investigate these developments in a holistic manner and from a wide range of perspectives: both public and private, business and consumer, regulators and supervisors. Initially, they set the framework of their analysis by discussing innovation cycles in financial services. Thereafter, they tackle the issue of financial innovations and their consequences for financial stability. They then review the new approaches to financial consumers' protection, which emerged in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. The authors underline the fact that this new approach is heavily influenced by the recent innovative drive in the financial industry. Next, they switch their attention to the public sector, examining the innovative processes in monetary policy and central banks, structural innovations in the supervisory models and systems, and they assess some specific supervisory challenges regarding blockchain and the application of mathematics in the supervisory capacity. Additionally, the book examines a range of issues related to the private sector, such as recent developments regarding risk transferring mechanisms on the financial market, artificial intelligence and natural language processing for regulatory filings, the development of process management in insurance companies and other innovative products on the market. Finally, Innovation in Financial Services discusses how the digital transformation of the financial system impacts the interaction between the public and private sectors. The book is intended for graduate and postgraduate level students, researchers, public sector officers, as well as financial sector practitioners.

This book applies finance to the field of capital theory. While financial economics is a well-established field of study, the specific application of finance to capital theory remains unexplored. It is the first book to comprehensively study this financial application, which also includes modern financial tools such as Economic Value Added (EVA (R)). A financial application to the problem of the average period of production includes two discussions that unfold naturally from this application. The first one relates to the dual meaning of capital, one as a monetary fund and the other one as physical (capital) goods. The second concerns its implications for business-cycle theories. This second topic (1) provides a solid financial microeconomic foundation for business cycles and, also (2) makes it easy to compare different business-cycle theories across the average period of production dimension. By clarifying the obscure concept of average period of production, the authors make it easier to analyze the similarities with and differences from other business-cycle theories. By connecting finance with capital theory, they provide a new point of view and analysis of the long-standing problems in capital theory as well as other related topics such as the use of neoclassical production functions and theorizing about business cycles. Finally, they emphasize that the relevance of their application rests on both its policy implications and its contributions to contemporary economic theory.

Multimodal Approaches to Media Discourses brings together contributions from an interdisciplinary group of scholars on corpus-assisted analyses of multimodal data on austerity discourses in the United Kingdom, which extend and expand on the understanding of austerity but also of the methodologies used to analyse multimodal corpora. The volume demonstrates how the austerity measures introduced in response to global economic and financial crises in recent years can be viewed as being more complexly layered than they appear, not simply reduced to their connections to spending cuts and fiscal debt. The book employs an innovative methodological approach, in which established and emerging scholars from linguistics and computational and social sciences critically reflect on the exact same set of data - multimodal texts and articles from The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph from 2010 to 2016. This framework allows for the exploration of the role of the media in mediating the public's assessment of austerity and the ideas, actors, emotions, geographies and broader material context which contribute to such perceptions. In so doing, the volume also offers unique insights into systematic analyses to multimodal data which may be applied to other topics and connected with other disciplines. Enhancing our awareness and assessment of austerity in public discourse and of the methodologies to study it, this book is key reading for students and researchers in discourse analysis, corpus linguistics, multimodality, and those working at the intersection of these fields.

The growth of Islamic finance today is significant, making it timely to meet the market demand across the world and particularly for Muslim countries by producing a cryptocurrency model under the Shari'ah ethical principles. This book addresses core components of cryptocurrency within the Maqasid al-Shari'ah in enabling students, academics, users, traders, issuers, promoters, facilitators, managers, regulators, decision makers, blockchain technology providers, financial authorities, and other relevant professionals to understand Shari'ah cryptocurrency and its practical mechanisms. Among the issues covered are corporate understanding, global phenomena and world view, the Shari'ah model, SWOT analysis, innovation, conventional practices and the Halaldichotomy, regulatory standards, blockchain and its technological paradigm, practicality, establishment, and operational mechanisms, Zakat and Waqf through cryptocurrency, risk factors, and takaful solution. This book establishes a Halal alternative model of cryptocurrency management within the Maqasid al-Shari'ah to meet the contemporary global market demand.

This book shows that the use of money transforms a market economy into a payment society where production and employment are subordinated to the logic of asset markets. Monetary policy emerged out of private banking business and was always exposed to the risk of losing credibility and reputation. The stability of key currency systems was based on different policy preferences. A simple game-theoretic macro model explains the working and the downfall of the gold standard, Bretton Woods and the European Monetary System. It is shown that waning willingness to accept foreign leadership in monetary policy affairs propelled the creation of the euro.

The Great Financial Crisis, which started in 2007-08, was originally called the 'sub-prime' crisis because its origins could be traced to excessive lending in the real estate sector in the US, concentrated mostly in sunbelt states like Nevada, Florida and California. There were similar pockets of excess lending for housing in Europe, notably in Ireland and Spain. But a key difference emerged later: in Ireland and Spain, the local banking systems almost collapsed and the governments experienced severe financial stress with large macroeconomic costs. Nothing similar happened in the US. The local financial system remained fully functional and the local governments did not experience increased financial stress in the states with the biggest real estate booms, like Nevada or Florida. This book illustrates how the structure of the US banking market and the existence of federal institutions allowed regional financial shocks to be absorbed at the federal level in the US, thus avoiding local financial crisis. The authors argue that the experience of the US shows the importance of a 'banking union' to avoid severe regional (national) financial dislocation in the wake of regional boom and bust cycles. They also discuss the extent to which the institutions of the partial banking union, now in the process of being created for the euro area, should be able to increase its capacity to deal with future regional boom and bust cycles, thereby stabilising the single currency.

Capital formation plays a large part in any evaluation of economic growth and decline. In recent years the provision of capital in the British industrial revolution has received renewed attention. This interest arises out of attempts to trace the course and explain the progress of the pioneer industrializing country; to assess the reasons for Britain's subsequent loss of economic pre-eminence; and to explain the process of industrialization in a general way, in particular on behalf of countries which are in the midst of this process today. The debate has been largely theoretical because of the lack of reliable data for the period prior to 1850, and up-to-date estimates for the period thereafter. This book seeks to remedy this lack. Part I, based largely on archival and other primary sources, contains detailed studies of the amount of capital invested in the main sectors of the economy (coal mining, agriculture, textiles, roads and waterways) from 1750-1850. Part II provides for the first time a comprehensive set of estimates compiled on a consistent basis for the entire period from 1750-1920. It thus provides the foundation for a full study of capital accumulation in Britain from the industrial revolution to the First World War.

Over forty years after the formal end of colonialism, suffocating ties to Western financial systems continue to prevent African countries from achieving any meaningful monetary sovereignty. Economic and Monetary Sovereignty in 21st Century Africa traces the recent history of African monetary and financial dependencies, looking at the ways African nations are resisting colonial legacies. Using a comparative, multi-disciplinary approach, this book uncovers what went wrong after the Pan-African approaches that defined the early stages of independence, and how most African economies fell into the firm grip of the IMF, World Bank, and the EU's strict neoliberal policies. This collection is the first to offer a wide-ranging, comparative and historical look at how African societies have attempted to increase their policy influence and move beyond neoliberal orthodoxy and US-dollar dependency. Economic and Monetary Sovereignty in 21st Century Africa is essential reading for anyone interested in the African quest for self-determination in a turbulent world of recurring economic and financial crisis.

The Great Financial Crisis, which started in 2007-08, was originally called the 'sub-prime' crisis because its origins could be traced to excessive lending in the real estate sector in the US, concentrated mostly in sunbelt states like Nevada, Florida and California. There were similar pockets of excess lending for housing in Europe, notably in Ireland and Spain. But a key difference emerged later: in Ireland and Spain, the local banking systems almost collapsed and the governments experienced severe financial stress with large macroeconomic costs. Nothing similar happened in the US. The local financial system remained fully functional and the local governments did not experience increased financial stress in the states with the biggest real estate booms, like Nevada or Florida. This book illustrates how the structure of the US banking market and the existence of federal institutions allowed regional financial shocks to be absorbed at the federal level in the US, thus avoiding local financial crisis. The authors argue that the experience of the US shows the importance of a 'banking union' to avoid severe regional (national) financial dislocation in the wake of regional boom and bust cycles. They also discuss the extent to which the institutions of the partial banking union, now in the process of being created for the euro area, should be able to increase its capacity to deal with future regional boom and bust cycles, thereby stabilising the single currency.

This innovative text offers an introduction to money, banking, and financial markets, with a special emphasis on the importance of confidence and trust in the macroeconomic system. It also presents the theory of endogenous money creation, in contrast to the standard money multiplier and fractional reserve explanation found in other textbooks. The U.S. economy and financial institutions are used to explain the theoretical and practical framework, with international examples weaved in throughout the text. It covers key topics including monetary policy, fiscal policy, accounting principles, credit creation, central banks, and government treasuries. Additionally, the book considers the international economy, including exchange rates, the Eurozone, Chinese monetary policy, and reserve currencies. Taking a broad look at the financial system, it also looks at banking regulation, cryptocurrencies, real estate, and the oil and gold commodity markets. Students are supported with chapter objectives, key terms, and problems. A test bank is available for instructors. This is an accessible introductory textbook for courses on money and banking, macroeconomics, monetary policy, and financial markets.

This work examines America's growing underground economy--its size, nature, and economic effects. The study begins with a critical analysis of the various methods used for measuring the size of the underground economy in the United States. It then develops a definition of the underground economy which is consistent with our system of national accounts. A sector-by-sector approach is used to measure the actual size of this sub-economy and to estimate the labor force involved. Finally, the author explores the economic consequences for the general economy of significant underground economic activity--for example: tax evasion, economic efficiency, and cyclical aspects.

This work will be of interest to scholars, students, and policy-makers in economics, economic policy, political science, and criminology.

In the wake of the drastic changes that have occurred in the world banking industry over the past two decades, Professor Canals's new book addresses several important questions: are universal banks bound to disappear? What is the role of universal banks and financial markets in the context of deregulation and disintermediation? What should banks' strategic reactions be to changes in the industry such as diversification, internationalization, and restructuring? And what role do banks play vis a vis modern financial markets? Canals draws on up-to-date case studies from Europe, Japan, and the US to provide a provocative reassessment of universal banking.

The Foundations of Monetary Economics presents an authoritative collection of key articles on monetary economics - one of the most contentious areas of economics. David Laidler - who has himself made important contributions - has selected those articles which are essential to an understanding of the origin and development of monetary economics. This important three-volume collection includes classic papers from the late 19th and early 20th centuries but places the emphasis on those papers written in the last half century. Particular weight is given to work that pays explicit attention to money's role in processes of exchange. Topics include the origins of money; cash in advance; overlapping generations and legal restrictions; theories of the demand for money; empirical studies of the demand for money; money, prices and output; money in general equilibrium and disequilibrium; money and clearing markets; credit market effects; monetary explanations of the cycle; money and the Great Depression; money and growth; monetary policy and the price level; rational expectations and monetary policy; central banking; free banking and the new monetary economics.

This book explores China's currency wars with its trading partners in four Western newsmagazines: Time, The Economist, L'Express, and Der Spiegel. Based on both quantitative and qualitative approaches, the interdisciplinary approach adopted in the research draws on two analytical frameworks from the realm of critical discourse analysis; van Leeuwen's socio-semantic inventory of social-actor representation, and van Dijk's concepts of macro-rules as the overarching approaches to understand the changing dynamics of international relations and the global economy through Western media. The sample in this study consists of 160 texts, half of which are focused on China and the other half on Japan, across a period of 12 months in 2010 (China) and in 1987 (Japan). Through the comparison of Western representation betwen China and Japan, the similarities and differences in their coverage have been revealed as even more striking, with regards to global politics and the international economy.